“imagine
Park,” a live-events stage where about 40 start-up companies and
technology providers demonstrate early-stage products and introduce new
services, returns for the third year to the cable show.

WASHINGTON—When
the annual Cable Show comes to the nation’s capital next month, a
primary goal is to bring policy and technology together. A top staff
member of the National Cable & Telecommunications Association
enthusiastically expects “hundreds and hundreds” of
congressional staff members plus officials from the FCC and other federal
agencies to look around the exhibits during the June 10-12 convention, getting
a guided tour of cable’s approach to multiscreen delivery (beyond
“TV Everywhere”), big data, gigabit ethernet, home networks
and internet protocol strategies, plus an array of copyright concerns.

All three sitting FCC commissioners—Acting Chair Mignon
Clyburn plus Commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel and Ajit Pai, along with NTIA
chief Larry Strickling and a roster of commission and Capitol Hill staffers
will speak at the convention, part of a conference program that includes 40
sessions ranging from financial and operations issues to the Spring Technical
forum.

Prime Location

Education Secretary Arne Duncan will speak to the convention, and
other government officials and entertainment celebrities were expected to be
added to the agenda. All three mornings of the Cable Show feature a general
session at which a mix-and-match group of executives from different industry
sectors will converse on stage. Among the participants are Comcast CEO Brian
Roberts, Time Warner Cable CEO Glenn Britt, Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman,
Discovery Communications CEO David Zaslav plus Anne Sweeny of The Walt Disney
Company, Ken Lowe of Scripps Networks and Ali Rowghani of Twitter.

“I’m thrilled that my third Cable Show is back
in D.C. where we have the opportunity to communicate directly with policy
makers about the incredible innovation, exciting new services and creative
dynamism that exists in cable,” NCTA President/CEO Michael Powell
told TV Technology. “Our industry has a great story to tell and will
take full advantage of the Cable Show platform to showcase the benefits we deliver
every day to American consumers.”

Specially targeted to policymakers and industry newcomers is
“The Observatory,” a large exhibit (and the starting point
for VIP tours) in the center of the show floor. It replaces the
“Broadband Nation” showcase that served as the
“big picture” introduction to current and future cable
services at the last time the show was in Washington in 2009. The exhibit,
built with the support of ARRIS (which is in the process of acquiring
Motorola’s cable TV products division), Comcast, Cox Communications,
CommScope, Ericsson, Time Warner Cable and others, includes demonstrations of
new interfaces and services in a “360 degree theater in which we’ll
tell cable’s story from end to end,” explains Barbara York,
senior vice president-industry affairs, who oversees all Cable Show activities.

“Our goal is the help the Washington audience understand
where the business is and where it’s going in the connected
future,” she says, echoing Powell’s objectives.

Across the aisle from The Observatory is “Imagine
Park,” now in its third year, a live-events stage where about 40
start-up companies and technology providers will demonstrate early-stage
products and introduce new services.

Mark Bell, NCTA’s vice president for industry affairs,
says that “much of the innovation” in Imagine Park fits
into three categories: “better interfaces, cable-to-go and cable on
the device you like.” The Imagine Park program will also include
system analytics, featuring research presentations from Parks Associates and PricewaterhouseCoopers
about using new measurement tools.

In a park-like environment amidst benches, refreshments and casual
discussions, a dozen sessions (typically 30 to 45 minutes each) will be spread
over three days. Individual developers and small panels will show their wares
and describe developments in cutely-named segments such as “Second
Screen Scene,” “Guide Garden,” “Slap
App-y,” “Startup Alley,” “Navigation
Station” and “Big Data Bazinga.” There will also
be broader discussions in Imagine Park on topics such as “TV on the
Device You Like,” “Internet of Everything” and
“RDK [Reference Design Kit] in Action.”

Spring Technical Forum

Some of the topics will also be explored in greater depth during
the Spring Technical Forum. Dan Pike, chief technology officer at GCI Cable in
Austin, Texas, is chairing the Spring Technical Forum again this year. More
than 30 papers will be presented during eight sessions, including new ones on
interfaces: “The Intersection of Intelligent Devices and Intelligent
Consumers.”

“We’ve got familiar topics and two new
subjects: big data and software-defined networks,” Pike told TV
Technology. He pointed out that as cable operators continue to identify new
approaches to information science—especially topics such as “how
to make the best use of a channel, encryption and modulation”
— the Forum takes on new dimensions. There will be a significant
focus on wireless operations for features such as home networking.

The annual CIO.IT agenda will also focus on big data, looking at
topics concerning cable’s use of the data deluge for analyses and
enhanced research. Sessions will include “dashboard
approaches” for big data analyses and how to use findings for identity
management and personalization.

Other general program sessions will address “emerging
business services powered by broadband,” cybersecurity, advertising
and “Best Practices for Operational Efficiency.” A panel of
investment analysts will offer their outlook on cable’s economic
future.

York expects about 10,000 attendees, approximately the same number
of people who came to the last two years’ shows in Boston and Chicago
but down significantly from the 13,000 who attended the 2009 Cable Show, which
was also held in D.C. The number of exhibitors, about 250 companies, will be
about the same as last year, although—as usual—many
companies are opting not to rent cement on the show floor and will demonstrate
their wares in nearby hotel suites.

Among the projects on the show floor is a “Hire Our
Heroes” job fair, a program of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to help
military veterans find employment. York says that the NCTA initiative is the
first time the “Hire Our Heroes” program has taken place on
any industry convention show floor.

More Cloud, Remote Service Technologies

Several exhibitors are bringing new cloud and interactive products
to the Cable Show.

EchoStar Technologies, a unit of the company that owns the DISH
satellite service, will unveil “Symbi,” a cloud-based
personal technology management system. Symbi provides customer service and
technical support that, according to EchoStar, will allow “call
center agents to resolve support issues with greater efficiency.” The
Symbi product suite, based on a SaaS (software as a service) platform, uses a
Semantic Knowledge Management System, which itself is a dynamic intelligence
engine.

ActiveVideo is accelerating its cloud-based user interfaces,
demonstrating an enhanced “CloudTV H5” platform that can
deliver video as an application to any connected device. The service will
enable network scalability and will allow operators and service providers (some
of whom will be unveiled during the show) to accelerate the rollout of
“UIs that support guides, navigation and rich media
applications,” according to Jeff Miller, ActiveVideo’s
president/CEO. ActiveVideo will also introduce a group of thin client software
aimed at the multiscreen environment; it includes CloudTV Nano, CloudTV Nano
Lite and CloudTV Trimware (name has been changed).

BlackArrow, which sells advanced advertising solutions for TV
platforms, will demonstrate systems to handle customized ad insertion and
alternate content that “will support the monetization of linear
content on IP devices by service providers and programmers,”
according to BlackArrow President Nick Troiano. The company plans to announce
new customers for its IP-based TV infrastructure products, which leverage SCTE
35 and other standards.

Features of the new “BlackArrow Linear”
software enable dynamic ad insertion of local or national ads within linear
streams, linear replication of original broadcast ads within linear streams,
linear addressability for targeted ads based on subscriber data and
“audience unification.”

Amdocs, which handles customer management and billing for Comcast
and many other distributors, will showcase a “Net Promoter
Score” process that will encourage existing subscribers to use online
social media to promote their provider. Amdocs will also demonstrate features
of a system it has proposed to ESPN for subsidizing wireless
connectivity—with suggestions on how cable operators can adopt
similar processes.

The FAA’s current rules and proposed ban on flight over people, requirement of visual line of sight and restriction on nighttime flying, effectively prohibit broadcasters from using UAS for newsgathering. ~ WMUR-TV General Manager Jeff Bartlett